{"id":2939,"date":"2021-11-03T07:05:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-03T07:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/computerscienced.co.uk\/site\/?p=2939"},"modified":"2021-11-02T22:32:09","modified_gmt":"2021-11-02T22:32:09","slug":"this-week-in-cs-history-2nd-november-1988-morris-worm-was-distributed-via-the-internet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/computerscienced.co.uk\/site\/this-week-in-cs-history-2nd-november-1988-morris-worm-was-distributed-via-the-internet\/","title":{"rendered":"This week in CS History – 2nd November 1988 – Morris Worm was distributed via the Internet"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The Morris Worm was the first worm to spread over the internet and cause large scale infection. It was released from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, on November 2, 1988 by student Robert Tappan Morris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The worm exploited a vulnerability in Unix systems, created by an implementation error of Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) derived operating systems.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

It gained access to computers through its clever use of the finger command, exploiting security vulnerabilities caused by poor programming practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The worm would then copy itself onto those computers and spread to other systems using those same holes. It accomplished this task quite efficiently: it would take less than one minute for the virus to travel from one infected system to another and infect it too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The replication was so destructive that it caused a viral denial of service attack, causing machines to crash and causing parts of the internet to be disconnected over a number of days while the infection was cleansed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Morris was found guilty of the attack and sentenced to 3 years probation and a $10,000 fine. <\/p>\n

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